Sitelink Extensions – A Simple Way to Boost Your Clickthrough

According to Google, ads tend to have a 30% jump in clickthrough rate when sitelinks are present, versus the usual standalone ads. Do we have your attention now? This day and age, it’s crucial that you target the right audience with the right messaging. Leverage the extra characters and real estate on the results page to capture attention and drive conversions.

Let’s Begin

This sounds good and all, but where should you start? Ask yourself these questions.

Where is the user going to navigate to next? Should you direct them to that page instead?

What is the best landing page for each category?

Do you have any top offers or promotions running? Pick the most popular.

Let’s Strategize

Target a certain number of sitelinks. Aim for 6 sitelinks for desktop, 4 or mobile. Although more characters are available at your disposal, short sitelinks have been shown to perform better on desktop (18-20 char.) and even shorter ones for mobile.

Highlight special features, benefits and promotions. Don’t just describe the company or the products they offer. Additionally consider adding simple call-to-actions, which have been shown to boost CTRs.

Think complementary. If there’s a clear connection between products and/or services that you offer, use this within your sitelink copy. It may just help you drive conversions in another direction!

Link Generic Searches to Specific Pages. Many people consistently use generic queries even though they have something specific in mind that they’re searching for. Use sitelinks by including product/service-specific content.

Let’s Analyze

To know for sure how effective your sitelinks are, test, test and test again. Run a sitelink for a certain time frame and then run the other for the same amount of time.

Tag your sitelinks. Utilize URL params to track sitelink performance.

Let’s Report

Reveal the results. But how do you view the performance data easily? Go to the Ads tab and segment by Click Type.